House Rules
Automatic Improved Eschew Materials All players automatically get the Improved Eschew Materials Feat as described below. New feat available for selection - Greater Improved Eschew Materials, anyone who gets Eschew Materials (ie. as a class feature) instead receives Greater Improved Eschew Materials. Reasoning: Buying small materials takes up valuable session time and money. Granting the below feat allows the game to go on without allowing spellcasters to cast powerful spells without the gp cost that usually comes with it. Improved Eschew Materials You can cast many spells without needing to utilize minor material components. Benefit: You can cast any spell with a material component costing 100 gp or less without needing that component. The casting of the spell still provokes attacks of opportunity as normal. If the spell requires a material component that costs more than 100 gp, you must have the material component on hand to cast the spell, as normal. Greater Improved Eschew Materials You can cast many spells without needing to utilize large material components. Benefit: You can cast any spell with a material component costing 1000 gp or less without needing that component. The casting of the spell still provokes attacks of opportunity as normal. If the spell requires a material component that costs more than 1000 gp, you must have the material component on hand to cast the spell, as normal. Leadership Feat Removed The Leadership Feat is not selectable. Reasoning: This feat causes great complications within the game some of which I will ist. Not only does it pose a potential OP danger it adds a great deal of complication to the game. Who's going to control the character(s), if the player then he gets more time focused on him as apposed to the other players - as well as allowing him to do strategic moves easier than they are intended to be performed (challenge caused by working with real people not yourself); if the DM it adds a degree of challenge as the DM needs to not use his knowledge of the encounter to influence the character which usually results in a bias towards helplessness instead of helpfulness - the DM has enough to worry about and control during the encounter and Campaign without this addition. On a side note often the character(s) gained by this feat end up being lost in the RP only to come into play during down time to use them to make money or during battles - removing some of the immersion. Summoner Archetypes Removed You may not choose any of the Summoner's Archetypes. Reasoning: Summoners' archetypes are OP. Even Piazo (the makers of Pathfinder) ban the use of Summoner archetypes at Pathfinder Society groups. Unchained Classes You may only choose unchained versions of classes if they are available. Reasoning: The classes they 'unchained' were for balance reasons. Cost of Living PCs pay a recurring cost of living tax. At the start of every game month, a PC must pay an amount of gold equal to the lifestyle bracket he wishes to live in—if he can't afford his desired bracket, he drops down to the first one he can afford. Reasoning: Handling minor expenditures (food, rent, taxes, idle purchases) in detail during play, and tracking every time a PC pays for a room, buys water, or pays a gate tax can swiftly become obnoxious and tiresome. Destitute (0 gp/month): The PC is homeless and lives in the wilderness or on the streets. A destitute character must track every purchase, and may need to resort to Survival checks or theft to feed himself. Poor (3 gp/month): The PC lives in common rooms of taverns, with his parents, or in some other communal situation—this is the lifestyle of most untrained laborers and commoners. He need not track purchases of meals or taxes that cost 1 sp or less. Average (10 gp/month): The PC lives in his own apartment, small house, or similar location—this is the lifestyle of most trained or skilled experts or warriors. He can secure any nonmagical item worth 1 gp or less from his home in 1d10 minutes, and need not track purchases of common meals or taxes that cost 1 gp or less. Wealthy (100 gp/month): The PC has a sizable home or a nice suite of rooms in a fine inn. He can secure any nonmagical item worth 5 gp or less from his belongings in his home in 1d10 minutes, and need only track purchases of meals or taxes in excess of 10 gp. Extravagant (1,000 gp/month): The PC lives in a mansion, castle, or other extravagant home—he might even own the building in question. This is the lifestyle of most aristocrats. He can secure any nonmagical item worth 25 gp or less from his belongings in his home in 1d10 minutes. He need only track purchases of meals or taxes in excess of 100 gp. Magic Healing Magical healing works by accelerating the rate at which someone heals. The benefit to this is that it has almost a 0% infection rate and minimizes scarring. Healing naturally is prone to infection and will leave more pronounced scars. Reasoning: Flavor. Resurrection Sickness Raising creatures from the dead is difficult, and as such there are few people in the world able to do it. Raise Dead, Resurrection, and any other spells that raise characters from the dead must be run by the GM before selection. In addition, After being resurrected from death, the raised character suffers from resurrection sickness for one week. Resurrection Sickness The creature is barley able to speak, perceive, or have coherent thought - steadily gaining back their senses and capabilities over a week. Reasoning: I like the concept that death is more permanent and raising someone from the dead requires a lot of effort. Language Equivalents Each language in Pathfinder has a real-world equivalent. Here are some of them: Common - English Elven - French Orcish - German Catfolk - Native American mix Dwarven - Irish/Scottish mix Azlanti - Chinese/Japanese mix Reasoning: I had a character come in from our world so we had to determine how he understood common. Alignment Restriction You may not choose Lawful Evil, Neutral Evil or Chaotic Evil characters. If you can give me a good reason behind picking one of these alignments, and can convince me that it will add to the game and wont just constantly cause problems for the party, I will let you choose one of these alignments. If everyone chooses Evil it is allowed. Reasoning: A evil character in a Good group does nothing but causes problems and decreases the fun. Diagonal Movement Permission Normally when measuring distance, the first diagonal counts as 1 square, the second counts as 2 squares, the third counts as 1, the fourth as 2, and so on. We do not adhere to this rule, any diagonal movement counts only as 1 square. Reasoning: We mistakenly have been doing it this way and I have seen no problems so far. If problems arise we can adjust this but since this applies to both PCs and NPCs I don't foresee one. Swift Action Economy You may choose to replace a move action with a swift action. Reasoning: Swift actions are supposed to be things that are so easy you can do them without taking up your standard or move actions. It makes sense that if you want to do a lesser action you can replace a more complicated one. This is consistent with the idea that you can replace a standard action with a move action. Surprise Round If you do an action that is completely unexpected you get the drop on your opponent and initiate a surprise round at the GM's discretion. Reasoning: Rules as written there ends up being an inconsistency, and the person 'surprising' the other actually receives no advantage and maybe even a disadvantage. For example say a PC charges at a NPC. They are both aware of each other. This aggressive action causes initiative be rolled before the charge actually occurs. Say the NPC wins initiative and uses his move action to move out of the way, behind something that would block the charge. Then the PC goes and does something other than charging, then the charge that caused the NPC to move never occurred. Meaning the NPC would be reacting to something that didn't happen, and any logical advantage the PC had to trying to surprise his opponent is lost. Ability Score Point-Buy Ability scores will be determined via a 20-point buy system. Reasoning: Makes sure no character outshines another, or is not fun because it is weak. Hit Dice Each time you level up, you may choose to roll for your hit-dice, or take the average. The decision to take the average must occur before the roll. If you roll a 1 you may re-roll, but at a step lower dice. Reasoning: Gambling is fun, but not everyone wishes to do so. Natural 20 If you roll a natural 20, before confirming the critical, you do max damage. Then you roll to confirm, and if you confirm you roll the extra damage normally. Example: Your character sheet shows you do 1d6+3 damage upon a successful hit. You roll a natural 20 on an attack roll, and confirm the critical. You do 9(6+3) + 1d6+3 damage. Reasoning: '''This way rolling a natural 20 during an attack is always exciting. Critical Hit Deck We use the critical hit deck. Upon a confirmed critical, a player draws a card from the deck and follows the instructions on it. If an attacker has Weapon Focus (or x3 crit modifier) for the weapon he confirmed the critical hit with, he may draw two cards from the deck and choose one of the results (from his attack type) to apply. A character with Greater Weapon Focus (or x4 crit modifier) may draw three cards. A player may instead roll normal damage and hold on to one card. He can exchange this card at any time to negate a critical fumble. If your weapon has a x3 or higher crit modifier you may choose not to draw at all and roll damage as you would as if we were not using the deck. Critical Miss Deck We use the critical miss deck. Upon a confirmed critical miss, a player draws a card from the deck and follows the instructions on it. The players draws an additional card every time they roll a 1 while trying to confirm the critical miss. The player continues to roll until a natural 1 does not show up. Encumbrance We do not use the encumbrance rules, instead it is up to the DM's discretion how much anyone can carry. '''Reasoning: Encumbrance is boring and annoying. Background Skills We use the Background Skills rules set as outlined in Unchained. Reasoning: I think it's a superiror rule set. Staggered Leveling We do not use exeperience points, instead players level up at the GM's discresion. We use the Staggered Advancement as outlined in Unchained. Reasoning: '''I think there are certain limitations with the standard leveling up and use of experience points. Custom Race You may choose the Clockmen race that I have created. It was created using official rules and thus theoretically should be balanced. The race was designed to favor more physical classes than mental but is not restricted such. It is also designed to be very flexible and as such unlike any other race, gives you a lot of options to choose from. '''Reasoning: Flavor. Luck Points I may choose at any point to alter something (ie. a dice roll, or event). After doing so I will award a 'Luck Point' to the affected person. They may use this point at any time (aside from the event awarded) to cause someone to re-roll in the luck point spender's favor. Reasoning: It allows me to alter things without having to lie about dice rolls. Custom Familiar You may choose the Mimic familiar that I have created stats for. It was created using other familiars as a base, and the mimic in the bestiary. Reasoning: Flavor. Deity Changes You may not choose to worship Baphomet, Iomedae, Sarenrae, or Zon-Kuthon. Instead you may choose to worship the custom deity Quetzalcoatl. In addition you may also choose to worship the custom deity The One True God. Reasoning: '''The Quetzalcoatl change is for lore reasons. The One True God addition is to allow Christians the ability to worship their God in-game. Group Composition I do not host games that include more than 3 players. '''Reasoning: I find that 3 is the perfect number of players. It allows proper amount of time for each player to interact and RP without it being too time-consuming and boring other players waiting to do something. It also assures that encounters do not take an overwhelming amount of time. Couple's Counseling I do not host games that include couples. Reasoning: Couples, while there is inherently nothing wrong with them, present some unique problems. If a couple is in midst of a personal fight, it will often negatively effect everyone's game. If the couple is there more to play with each other than to play with the game, if one can't make a session the other becomes lax and dull during that session. In a similar vein if one couple is unable to make a session often the other cannot make it. Often couples will take increased interest in each other's actions and motivations, and disregard the other players'. Price to Pay Simply everyone needs to contribute in some way. Some examples of contribution that we have done in the past: driving, DMing, bringing drinks and snacks. Reasoning: There are many different ways to handle the cost of playing. Many groups have a pot where everyone puts a dollar in every session, and the group decides what game-related things to purchase with those funds. There are also many ways groups handle compensating the DM for the effort he has to put in over the PCs, such as one where the DM doesn't pay for food, and the rest of the group splits the bill among each other. We have no fee-per-session, and since we are not exactly what I'd call, 'financially stable' there is no longer an entry fee.